Journolist docs show libs conspiring to kill Rev. Wright story

It appears that the famous liberal listserv -- the so-called Journolist made up of prominent MSM reporters, academics, and pundits -- was everything conservative critics said about it.

The Daily Caller has acquired documents that show the conspiratorial nature of the list and its ability to massage and manipulate the news.

This is especially true in the case of how the press leaders on the list conspired to kill the Reverend Wright story:

According to records obtained by The Daily Caller, at several points during the 2008 presidential campaign a group of liberal journalists took radical steps to protect their favored candidate. Employees of news organizations including Time, Politico, the Huffington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Guardian, Salon and the New Republic participated in outpourings of anger over how Obama had been treated in the media, and in some cases plotted to fix the damage.

In one instance, Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent urged his colleagues to deflect attention from Obama's relationship with Wright by changing the subject. Pick one of Obama's conservative critics, Ackerman wrote, "Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares - and call them racists."

Michael Tomasky, a writer for the Guardian, also tried to rally his fellow members of Journolist: "Listen folks-in my opinion, we all have to do what we can to kill ABC and this idiocy in whatever venues we have. This isn't about defending Obama. This is about how the [mainstream media] kills any chance of discourse that actually serves the people."

"Richard Kim got this right above: ‘a horrible glimpse of general election press strategy.' He's dead on," Tomasky continued. "We need to throw chairs now, try as hard as we can to get the call next time. Otherwise the questions in October will be exactly like this. This is just a disease."

You really should read the entire article. The depth of hatred against the right is on full display, as this little gem from blogger/pundit Spencer Ackerman proves:

"Part of me doesn't like this sh*t either," agreed Spencer Ackerman, then of the Washington Independent. "But what I like less is being governed by racists and warmongers and criminals."

Ackerman went on:

I do not endorse a Popular Front, nor do I think you need to. It's not necessary to jump to Wright-qua-Wright's defense. What is necessary is to raise the cost on the right of going after the left. In other words, find a rightwinger's [sic] and smash it through a plate-glass window. Take a snapshot of the bleeding mess and send it out in a Christmas card to let the right know that it needs to live in a state of constant fear. Obviously I mean this rhetorically.

Obviously. Except what kind of a diseased mind would even ask a rhetorical question that shows delight in sending out a picture of a "bleeding mess" to conservatives in order to put them in a "constant state of fear?"

I would suggest Mr. Ackerman is in dire need of an intervention if he hates anyone that much.

But it is the insidious nature of the cooperation to kill stories of which they don't approve, spin stories to affect public perception, and come up with a common strategy to oppose their enemies that should send a shiver down the spine of anyone who values freedom of the press.

Stay tuned on this story. This is probably not the last we've heard from the Daily Caller on the Journolist.

Thomas Lifson adds:

This is hard evidence of a real vast left wing conspiracy. My favorite quote from the article comes from Katha Pollit of the Nation:

The people who attacked Clinton on Monica were prissy and ridiculous, but let me tell you it was no fun, as a feminist and a woman, waving aside as politically irrelevant and part of the vast rightwing conspiracy Paula, Monica, Kathleen, Juanita

Not only does Pollit admit her own hypocrisy on women as a feminist, while in the process of being part of a genuine vast left wing conspiracy to manage the news and punish those who publicize information harmful to Obama, she unselfconsciously uses the vast right wing conspiracy meme.

It appears that the famous liberal listserv -- the so-called Journolist made up of prominent MSM reporters, academics, and pundits -- was everything conservative critics said about it.

The Daily Caller has acquired documents that show the conspiratorial nature of the list and its ability to massage and manipulate the news.

This is especially true in the case of how the press leaders on the list conspired to kill the Reverend Wright story:

According to records obtained by The Daily Caller, at several points during the 2008 presidential campaign a group of liberal journalists took radical steps to protect their favored candidate. Employees of news organizations including Time, Politico, the Huffington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Guardian, Salon and the New Republic participated in outpourings of anger over how Obama had been treated in the media, and in some cases plotted to fix the damage.

In one instance, Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent urged his colleagues to deflect attention from Obama's relationship with Wright by changing the subject. Pick one of Obama's conservative critics, Ackerman wrote, "Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares - and call them racists."

Michael Tomasky, a writer for the Guardian, also tried to rally his fellow members of Journolist: "Listen folks-in my opinion, we all have to do what we can to kill ABC and this idiocy in whatever venues we have. This isn't about defending Obama. This is about how the [mainstream media] kills any chance of discourse that actually serves the people."

"Richard Kim got this right above: ‘a horrible glimpse of general election press strategy.' He's dead on," Tomasky continued. "We need to throw chairs now, try as hard as we can to get the call next time. Otherwise the questions in October will be exactly like this. This is just a disease."

You really should read the entire article. The depth of hatred against the right is on full display, as this little gem from blogger/pundit Spencer Ackerman proves:

"Part of me doesn't like this sh*t either," agreed Spencer Ackerman, then of the Washington Independent. "But what I like less is being governed by racists and warmongers and criminals."

Ackerman went on:

I do not endorse a Popular Front, nor do I think you need to. It's not necessary to jump to Wright-qua-Wright's defense. What is necessary is to raise the cost on the right of going after the left. In other words, find a rightwinger's [sic] and smash it through a plate-glass window. Take a snapshot of the bleeding mess and send it out in a Christmas card to let the right know that it needs to live in a state of constant fear. Obviously I mean this rhetorically.

Obviously. Except what kind of a diseased mind would even ask a rhetorical question that shows delight in sending out a picture of a "bleeding mess" to conservatives in order to put them in a "constant state of fear?"

I would suggest Mr. Ackerman is in dire need of an intervention if he hates anyone that much.

But it is the insidious nature of the cooperation to kill stories of which they don't approve, spin stories to affect public perception, and come up with a common strategy to oppose their enemies that should send a shiver down the spine of anyone who values freedom of the press.

Stay tuned on this story. This is probably not the last we've heard from the Daily Caller on the Journolist.

Thomas Lifson adds:

This is hard evidence of a real vast left wing conspiracy. My favorite quote from the article comes from Katha Pollit of the Nation:

The people who attacked Clinton on Monica were prissy and ridiculous, but let me tell you it was no fun, as a feminist and a woman, waving aside as politically irrelevant and part of the vast rightwing conspiracy Paula, Monica, Kathleen, Juanita

Not only does Pollit admit her own hypocrisy on women as a feminist, while in the process of being part of a genuine vast left wing conspiracy to manage the news and punish those who publicize information harmful to Obama, she unselfconsciously uses the vast right wing conspiracy meme.